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Wednesday, November 22, 2017

We Survived!

Another year of the Black Friday edition of the paper is out the door! In fact, we did it in record time, starting at 11:40 and having every paper done just a little before 2 pm. This is an hour longer than it usually takes, but is our best time for this huge, once a year, edition.

It was scheduled to have 20 inserts. This morning, the order got upped to 21. That is not good. We only have 9 stations, one for the cover and 8 for inserts, so if there are more than 8 inserts we make packets ahead of time which can then go through as if they were one thing. We had already finished all the packets. But guess what? We had to make yet another one this morning.

Here are some of the insert packets.

Here are some more of the insert packets.

Here is Beth, bringing in another pallet of insert packets.

Here are pallets full of the inserts that didn't go in packets.

One of the real challenges of papers with so many inserts is how the loose bundles of stuffed papers will stack. If there are certain sizes or types of paper next to each other they tend to jam or slide which can lead to machine stopping, or an inability to handle the bundles and get them to the strapper neatly. Some inserts have flaps which are especially nasty for the machine. So Beth did a very good job of planning the packets to alternate glossy paper with non-glossy, prevent catching flaps, etc.

Here is the inserter machine, running papers (you can see them in the track on the far right).

The semi-broken stacker did agree to accept them, and we put them in stacks of 10. (Usually it's 50.) Each paper weighed 1.6 pounds, which puts a bundle at 16 pounds. I sent close to 600 bundles out.

Actually, the challenge of doing something out of the ordinary tends to energize me. It was kind of fun to succeed, and succeed well, at pulling off a very complicated puzzle with a team of people who individually work very hard at what could be described as 'not a very satisfying job.'

After that was all over, we had to run some packets for the next publication we do (Friday). We get tomorrow off. Yippie!